Hope everyone had a Christmas that tickled them right down to their toes; I love Christmas, and I love when all the hustle and bustle is done. But, the holidays can’t be over until we finish up with some Christmas finds submitted by faithful readers.

Terri sent this pic of holiday wear:

Oh dear, where to start … Well, if you have an over-the-top Christmas sweater, you can add these pants to the mix; you’re sure to win the ugly Christmas outfit contest hands down, for going the extra mile. I’m grateful that the snowmen aren’t any closer to the zipper area; can you imagine the second looks that might cause? Of course, now we begin to wonder how the back of the pants are decorated; from a distance, a backside decorated with snowmen would probably look like someone sat on a bench full of pigeon poop. Thanks Terri for planting this image in our minds–turnabout is fair play!

Connie received a box of plastic WWII patriotic Christmas ornaments from her mother-in-law:

Here’s a close-up of the Santa and snowman:

They were given to her father-in-law for Christmas, when he was a child. We had never seen these kinds of ornaments before, although plastic was widely used during WWII to save metal for the war effort. Very cool decorations Connie–thanks for sharing!

Our final entry in the Christmas portion of the post, is my neighbor’s fab fifties Santa and his reindeer decoration:

They have decorated their house with a look that works with a 1950’s ranch, using big light bulbs and simple trees. One of those aluminum trees with the color wheel would put this display right over the top.

We have a few odds and ends of Friday Finds to finish up before the new year. We feel compelled by compassion to warn you about the really nasty clown; he is right after this first set of pics.

We love vintage luggage; this set must have been very stylish when new:

We can imagine the lucky couple boarding a train for a trip to the big city with all their evening clothes carefully packed. The label says:

We wish there was something we could do with vintage luggage, except using it for storage. It’s just too big to display in our houses.

Everyone must know by now that we hate clowns, and usually don’t take pictures of them for the blog. But every so often we run into something that can’t be ignored:

He is pinching his nose shut with his hand; I outlined the hand so you could see all the gruesome details. Why is he holding his nose you ask?

Yes, someone thought it would be cute to make a planter of a clown on the toilet! Truly we live in end times, if this thing is “cute”. Uugghhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OK, back to our usual level of bad:

Maybe, just maybe, over-the-top sequin kitty can take the bad taste of clowns out of your mouth. It’s just possible that with a few more beads and sequins, this kitty might cross over to the land of “so bad it’s good”, but we’ll never know since we left her sitting right where we found her.

We have a couple of dolly finds that may amuse you:

What is it about this doll that says Basilica di S. Pietro to the buyer? We just don’t get it; she looks kind of southern US with that big ol’ hat.

This girl has a Skipper face:

But her body is cheap and lightweight; nothing like a real Skipper. She is a cute little clone, but this thrift store has terrible prices, and we rarely buy anything there.

We have two more fun vintage things:

We aren’t sure where this plaque would fit into a home’s decor, but those faces would make really cute dolls.

This cutting board is so funny:

We are mightily amused by vintage Japanese kitchen items; nothing says kitchen decor like a cock-fight! The handle at the top is a knife, and there is a little phrase burned into the wood on the back: Cut on this side ’n’ spare my face.

Finally, since this post has a clown, what the heck, here are some shells (which might well be our second least favorite thing):

Here is proof positive that shells DO NOT make everything better! Why oh why did the maker put shells on a knitted winter hat? Let’s put snowflakes on bikinis–it would be equally complementary.

Thanks so much for reading our blog for yet another year. We wish you all a happy and healthy new year full of fun and laughter (and Second Hand Roses).

I love the vintage luggage! I too, wish that I had a house with larger rooms… would just love to display a complete set (and it would be even better if there were stickers from all the far away places folks had traveled too!).

I actually have one of those vintage tinsel trees. With the rotating color wheel lights to shine on it and everything. Yes, it used to belong to my parents. They want me to sell it on eBay. I’m not sure I’m ready to part with it. It does go well with our house (built in 1961).